The majority of SQL Server Replication topologies are based on the Central Publisher model, which is comprised of a single publisher replicating to one or more subscribers. Another replication model, which is sometimes overlooked, is the Central Subscriber model, which is comprised of multiple publishers replicating to one subscriber using… Read more

Heads up everyone. Next Tuesday January 22nd, 2013 Chad Churchwell (blog | twitter) will be presenting a webinar on behalf of Pragmatic Works on protecting your replication environment with AlwaysOn Availability Groups. I've had the pleasure of following Chad over the last year and have really come to… Read more

One trick I have learned from the folks on the Replication Support Team is how to proactively audit data changes in Merge Replication. This is useful when troubleshooting issues such as identifying where data changes are coming from, who is causing them, and what the data is before and after… Read more

I’m pleased to announce that this Wednesday April 11th 2012 Hilary Cotter will be presenting for the PASS DBA Virtual Chapter on SQL Server Replication. Replication is a powerful and flexible data distribution solution that has become one of the more mature features in SQL Server. Come listen to Microsoft… Read more

I was recently asked about synchronizing a Merge pull subscription in SQL Server Express using RMO, the lack of a SQL Server Agent, and what to do about it. Since SQL Server Express does not include the SQL Server Agent, pull subscriptions must be synchronized by some other means. The… Read more

Looking for ways to do things more quickly and efficiently, I thought I would talk a little bit about sp_addscriptexec and how it can be leveraged to expedite the process of executing SQL scripts in a replication topology. By creating and saving a SQL script on a publisher, it can… Read more

Over the last couple of years I've come to the conclusion that the default replication agent profiles just don't cut it. For example, usually I want my replication agent jobs (Snapshot, Log Reader, Distribution, or Merge) to have a custom replication agent profile which differs from the default agent profile.… Read more

SQL Azure Data Sync

This weekend I decided to setup a SQL Azure sync group to synchronize a SQL Azure database with an on-premise replication publisher. I was curious if this would work, as I’ve been unable to find any documentation stating whether or not SQL Azure Data Sync can… Read more

This blog post is basic in nature but highlights a very real requirement that may arise when administering replication. Occasionally we, as Database Administrators, need to grant non-administrator business users the ability to run replication agent jobs due to business needs. Instead of giving the business user the ability to… Read more

I've noticed in the forums there have been a number of people inquiring about making schema changes in a replication topology. I understand the concern and I'm here to assure you that yes, it is possible to do. If you think about it, DDL statements are used to create and… Read more

One of the cool things about Merge Replication is that it has the capability of revealing very interesting information regarding applications and their associated statements ran against published articles. We can learn quite a bit about an application just by the sheer number of data changes that are replicated as… Read more

I started a list of the resources I frequent the most in the MSDN Library SQL Server Books Online - Replication, Technical Articles and Whitepapers, Blogs and Websites, Videos, Forums, and Books - Replication Bookmarks.

I find myself visiting these pages often and thought this could be a useful… Read more